


The Will of Yesterday

by CandyCoatedCocaine



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-29
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2018-09-13 02:08:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9101656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CandyCoatedCocaine/pseuds/CandyCoatedCocaine
Summary: Ginny left England a year ago without a word to anyone. Draco Malfoy has spent months trying to find her and has finally pinpointed her location. Can he figure out why she left and convince her to come home?





	1. Prologue

“What’s your poison?” Ginny asked from behind the bar.

“Emotionally unavailable women” the man replied. She chuckled and looked up, meeting with his eyes and immediately feeling her blood turn cold. Draco Malfoy was sitting on the other side, looking back at her with that smirk that she’d always hated. Malfoy had become very skilled at tracking people down after Voldemort’s death, earning quite a reputation for himself. It made sense, he became very good at disguise magic after his family had been disgraced and tabloids wrote constantly about how awful the Malfoys were, in order to avoid being seen in public. She’d heard that he’d gotten into it because he was bored. He didn’t need to work, being old money and all, but it helped pass the time. Of course, he didn’t need to wear a disguise in this muggle bar. No one but her would have any idea who he was. 

Ginny had been living primarily as a muggle in America for a little over a year now. She’d almost stopped worrying that someone would find her. 

“I want something that suits my mood,” he said, with that stupid sarcastic smile still plastered across his smug face.

“Sorry, we’re all out of liquid evil,” she retorted, as she wiped the bar down and avoided eye contact. It was the middle of the day so the bar was practically empty, save for a young woman at the end drinking a beer on her lunch break. Ginny often saw her during odd hours and sometimes wondered if she was an alcoholic.

“Then a whiskey will do” he replied, his face suddenly serious. She poured him a whiskey and passed it to him across the bar.

“So, how’d you find me?” she asked, plainly.

“It wasn’t easy, I’ll give you that much, Weasley.” he said, taking a sip from the whiskey she had prepared. “I’ve been looking for you for six months. You barely left a trace. I’m actually kind of impressed.”

“Yeah, well. That wasn’t an accident. I didn’t want to be found.” Her face hardened, leaving Draco to wonder if he should prepare to defend himself.

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that he hired you,” she started, “You two were always so obsessed with each other, you should have just shagged and got it over with.” If her eyes had rolled any harder, they might have fallen out of her head.

“Well, now, I’m not special. Everyone was obsessed with the great Harry Potter back when we were in school. Even you, if I recall.”

“We aren’t in school anymore, and I don’t really have any intentions of going back with you.”

“I think this will change that.” he replied, reaching into his jacket pocket and pulling out a letter. He set it down on the counter, gently. Ginny recognized the handwriting immediately as that of her best friend, Luna Lovegood. Before she could stop herself, she hastily grabbed the letter off of the counter and tore it open. 

Ginny,

I’m sorry I hired Draco to find you, but I didn’t know who else to ask and I needed to tell you that Neville proposed! We want you to come home so that you can be the maid of honor in the wedding! Please come xx 

Yours, 

Luna

Tears immediately came pouring out, as she tried in vain to hide her emotions from Malfoy. “I haven’t missed it already, have I?” she asked, her voice breaking.

“No,” he mumbled, gently. “Neither of them would plan anything until you were found.” Ginny nodded before excusing herself and disappearing into a small room behind the bar. No matter how overwhelmed by emotions she felt, she was determined not to let that show to Malfoy, of all people. She felt guilty for leaving, overjoyed for her best friends, relieved that she hadn’t missed the wedding, honored that they hadn’t planned it without her, jealous that Luna had found someone she loved while she was hiding away, and completely terrified of going back to England all at once. She took a few breaths, steadied herself, and made her way back to Malfoy.

“You sure left a trail of broken hearts behind you. Practically every boy you fancied in school came knocking on my door after seeing the Daily Prophet article about the split.” he said, sipping his whiskey.

“So why didn’t you turn up any sooner then?” she retorted.

“And be on the end of one of your famous bat-bogey hexes again? No thanks!” he remembered her last hex quite vividly, and was certainly not trying to relive the memory.

Ginny chuckled, because he was right. If he had come on behalf of anyone other than Luna, she would have hexed him immediately. 

“I don’t want anyone to know I’ve returned, though. At least not until the ceremony.” she replied, worried about more gossip articles being written about her return. Not to mention having to face her family. Draco understood her plight. In some ways, he was quite jealous of her strength to just run away and leave her family behind.

“I have a place you can stay in the meantime. A safe house sort of thing. I can keep you disguised in public as well, if you’d like. For a fee, of course.” His family had a small isolated home away from their manor. Draco had never brought anyone there before, but he sympathized with Ginny’s reluctance to come back.

“Of course.” she scoffed, but was willing to pay regardless.”Shall we go, then?”


	2. Chapter 1

“Of course you forgot, you never think of anything but yourself!” Ginny shouted, throwing the still half-wrapped gift on the floor. Of course he’d given her a fucking diary. Of course he’d forgotten that maybe she wouldn’t ever want to think of a diary again. 

He gripped her arm, a little too tightly for her comfort. “DON’T TOUCH ME!” she screamed, her voice angry and dripping with vitriol. Click-clack. Unsurprisingly, the sound of cameras clicking started sprouting up, no doubt trying to catch a photo of the lover’s spat. Ginny stormed out, leaving Harry to deal with the adoring press alone. 

Weeks later, Ginny sat alone in the corner of a bar, the photos from that night haunting her on all the papers. The press demanded to know if the pair had split. There was speculation that Harry had cheated, that she had cheated, that the two were fighting about money. The truth was more complicated than any of that. There was a certain bitterness that she felt about being Harry’s arm candy. She had participated just as much in the Battle of Hogwarts, had endured just as much torture, knew firsthand how evil and manipulative Voldemort was. Yet, no one cared what she thought or how she felt about it. Everyone seemed to expect her to smile and support her loving boyfriend, The Chosen One, the one who defeated the great evil. Of course he deserved it, of course he was grateful and in awe of him. Still, she couldn’t shake the resentment she felt whenever he was around. He frequently forgot about things that were important to her, her family had barely asked her how she was doing after the war, instead focusing entirely on her relationship with Harry. Were they going to get married? Were they going to have babies? How lucky she was that The Chosen One had chosen her for a girlfriend! And maybe a wife soon? 

After Voldemort had been killed, news of the seven horcruxes had spread fast throughout the wizarding world. Her connection to two horcruxes, Harry and the diary, caused people to speculate about her relationship with Tom Riddle. Some particularly vicious rumors started circulating implying that her relationship with Harry was simply the closest she could get to Voldemort now that he was dead. Worse still, there were certain people who wanted him back and thought that she was the key in bringing that about. Harry was sweet, but he was constantly busy with Auror training and she ultimately felt that he would never care about her the way he cared about her brother and Hermione. She couldn’t imagine feeling less bitter about how things had turned out for her. 

~

“Weasley! Did you lose your hearing in the muggle world or what?” 

Malfoy’s voice brought Ginny back to the moment, as she’d been lost in her thoughts about why she left the wizarding world in the first place. She wasn’t sure that she was ready to come back, but she needed to be there for Luna. 

“Sorry, yes, I have an apparating licence. Yes.” she mumbled, quietly. It’d been quite a while since she’d apparated, though, so she was almost certainly going to throw up. 

“All right, good to know. I have a portkey to the house, I’m sure that would be easier for now.” Draco used the fabric of his sleeve to pull a small card out of the pocket of his trousers. It was deep purple with gold engraving and made of a thick paper. Ginny reached out and touched it, feeling the familiar pull in her stomach. Soon, she was standing inside a large room, with white glistening floors and matching black furniture. A couch, a small table, a bookshelf; all black. Draco had forgotten that the house only had one bedroom when he had offered to let her stay. 

“You can stay in the room down the hall and on the left,” he offered. “Okay.” Ginny headed into the room. 

A few hours later, she heard a knock on the door. She grumbled as she got up to answer it. 

“There are still a few things we need to discuss, Weasley.” 

Ginny stepped out of the bedroom and walked into the kitchen, pouring herself a glass of water before making her way to the couch in the living room. She looked tired, more tired than he’d ever seen her. But he noticed something else in her expression, too. Something like fear. He knew that she wasn’t enthusiastic about coming back, but what could she be afraid of?

“What is it then?” she asked, appearing more annoyed by the minute.

“Well, now that you’re my client-” he started, before she interrupted him.

“Client?!” 

He looked at her incredulously. “Luna didn’t hire me to bring you back, she hired me to deliver her letter. As far as I’m concerned, any business I had with her is now over. So if you want my help, you’re going to have to accept being my client.” 

~

“So how does this work, exactly?” she asked, tentatively. Draco could tell she was nervous by the way she picked at her fingernails. It was a habit she’d always had, one that he used to notice before quidditch games and after fights with her paramours when she’d storm through the library. She’d place one nail under the other and run it along the edge, where the nailbed meets the skin. It was an odd habit, but not a particularly noticeable one. Sometimes she would hide her hands under the table to avoid people seeing it. 

“I suppose that depends on what, exactly, you want me to tell Luna.” he replied, cautious not to trigger the infamous Weasley temper. “I don’t want you to tell her anything, I want to see her myself. I just…” she wavered, pausing in the middle of her sentence “I just…don’t want anyone to see me. Except her. And you, as the case may be.” he smirked at her last comment, before he noticed her eyes wandering to the scattering of newspaper clippings about her that were spread all over the coffee table. 

“Learn anything interesting?” she asked, the challenge almost palpable in her voice. Truthfully, he hadn’t learned anything that wasn’t common knowledge among their classmates. Everyone knew that she and Harry had been having relationship problems, even before the papers had started reporting on it. Harry had moved out of their flat, in with Ron and Hermione, leaving Ginny alone with their space. “Not really,” he answered, honestly. “I learned a lot more from your letters to Luna.”

Ginny’s face turned a shade of red. She didn’t get sentimental often, but her letters to Luna certainly qualified as such and she hadn’t ever anticipated anyone else reading them. Draco noticed her discomfort and dropped the subject, lest he end up on the other end of one of her nasty hexes. Instead, he contacted Luna and made plans to meet with her. Plans were set for a few days out. He discussed with Ginny how he would disguise her, changing several of her individual features. He changed her hair to a dark brown color, eliminated her freckles, made her appear a few inches taller, and altered her nose shape. During the process, he noticed a mark on her wrist. It was small, and looked something like a burn mark but almost like a feather simultaneously. It must have been something she got during the war, he thought. The days passed pretty uneventfully, with both of them mostly keeping to themselves until they traveled to meet Luna at Hog’s Head Inn. 

They sat themselves at a little booth, side by side, without speaking to each other. Ginny looked over her shoulder nervously every few minutes, which piqued Draco’s curiosity. What was she nervous about? Luna certainly didn’t seem angry about her leaving, and her disguise was enough to keep anyone else from recognizing her. Eventually, Luna walked in. She looked around before noticing the two of them and making her way over and throwing her arms around Ginny in a hug. 

“Thanks for coming back, Gin. It’s so good to see you.” she said, pulling away and taking a seat at the booth across from the two of them.

“Of course I came back! Congratulations on the wedding! Sorry about…you know…it being hard to…contact me…” she struggled to say what she felt without giving away too many details to the Malfoy. 

“It’s fine, I’m just glad you’re here because I wanted to ask you,” she paused, but Ginny suspected that she knew what Luna was about to say, “If you would be my Maid of Honor?” 

“Yes! Yes! Obviously, of course.” she stammered out, tears welling in her eyes. Malfoy sat silently, feeling slightly uncomfortable at being present for a conversation that definitely didn’t benefit from his presence. He found it odd that Ginny had been so unwilling to return, given how delighted her friend seemed to be to see her. She hadn’t ever seemed the type to care about anyone’s opinion of her, certainly not gossip magazines. The two women continued making plans while he looked out the window and tried not to feel jealous. His only real friend these days was Blaise Zabini, but he mostly kept to himself. Luna had been exceptionally nice to him throughout the course of their transactions and he was certainly going to miss her being a regular part of his life.

It occurred to Ginny that accepting the role as Maid of Honor meant that she wouldn’t be heading back to America any time soon, so she was going to have to put together some kind of plan if she didn’t want to return to her and Harry’s old flat. She couldn’t possibly stay with Malfoy that whole time…but how else was she going to avoid everyone? 

While Luna and Draco worked out her payment to him, Ginny approached the bar and asked for a firewhiskey, her favorite. She was sitting alone at the bar, waiting for her drink when she felt a hand roughly grab her wrist. “You have that mark on your arm, you’re the Weasley girl, aren’t you? You think a glamour can protect you from us?” a male voice spoke softly in her ear, grabbing her roughly. “I’m sorry, you have the wrong person, now get your hands off of me!” she shouted in her best american accent, ripping her arm from his grasp. 

Draco noticed a struggle between Ginny and a man he didn’t recognize at the bar and walked over next to her, sliding an arm around her waist. “You must be mistaken, my friend, this is Kaylee and she’s my girlfriend. Just moved here today from America, where it’s considered rude to grab people you don’t know,” he turned towards her, his performance shockingly believable for being so off the cuff “Forgive me, darling, not all brits are this barbaric”

Ginny decided to play along, if it would get the man away from her. She gave a chuckle, stroking Draco’s jawline affectionately. “I knew I shouldn’t have let you convince me to move here.” Her hands were gentle against his skin, and he smiled down at her. She could tell by his eyes that he was trying to tell her to trust him, and he could tell that she was skeptical but was willing to go along with it. The bartender handed Ginny her firewhiskey, and she walked back to the booth where Luna was sitting, anxious to avoid being near this stranger any longer.

The man and Draco were still standing by the bar. “That girl has the exact same mark on her arm that the Weasley girl has, do you expect me to believe that’s a coincidence?” he muttered, through gritted teeth. “And what importance does the Weasley girl have to you, might I ask? Last I heard, she’s been MIA for a while now”. The man narrowed his eyes at Draco suspiciously. “It’s not her, it’s something that she has. She has something that we could benefit from. I suppose it’s also a coincidence that your…girlfriend…seems remarkably close with Luna Lovegood, a girl known for being close to Ginny Weasley?”

“I suppose it is.” he replied, sternly, before turning to join Ginny and Luna back in the booth. What the hell had that girl gotten him into? 

~

“What the hell was that, Ginny?!” Draco yelled, sternly, once they were back in his family’s safehouse. She pulled her sweater tighter around her shoulders, crossing her arms across her body, as if that would protect her from his ire. 

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have gotten you involved, I can just–” she started.

“You didn’t get me involved. Luna did, when she hired me to track you down. Look, I don’t mind helping you avoid the public eye, if that’s what you want, but you need to tell me the truth about what’s going on if you want me to keep helping you.” he interrupted, his voice lower now, but still stern.

Ginny started digging under her fingernails again while she avoided eye contact. 

“How did you find me, honestly?” she asked. She never told anyone where she was going, not even Luna. None of her letters gave any indication of where she was hiding or why she left, she had made sure of it. It was imperative that she never put Luna or Neville in danger after what had happened. In response to her question, Draco raised an eyebrow. 

“If I reveal my methods, I’ll be out of a job.” he replied, although honestly, this job wasn’t exactly paying the bills anyway. He’d actually already been placed in charge of his family’s estate, but he couldn’t bring himself to spend any time at the manor. Too many bad memories. 

“Do you want me to trust you or not?” she challenged, frustrated with his evasiveness. 

“Fine. After trying to track you down and talking to nearly everyone you’ve had a conversation with and getting nowhere, I managed to use a tracking spell using a piece of your hair.” he confessed.

The color fell out of Ginny’s face and she looked white as a sheet. “Where the hell did you get my hair?” 

“From your only brother who would speak to me.”

“Percy?”

“That’s the one. How’d you know?”

“He’s the most forgiving.” her face hardened, leaving Draco feeling rather intimidated. You can buy your way out of most things, that much he’d learned, but you can’t buy your way out of getting punched. 

“Don’t be too upset with him. He was worried about you. Demanded that he be present for the spell and threatened to murder me if any harm came to you.” he wasn’t sure if that information would ease her worries about her privacy, but he wasn’t sure what else to say. No one else in her family would speak to him. He’d been turned away by over half of the people he tried to ask for information. Harry met up with him, briefly, to say that he and Ginny had been having problems for quite a while and that he’d moved out of their flat and that he had no idea where she had gone and why, but more importantly, he didn’t really care. He confessed that Ginny had been getting more resentful of his fame and responsibility as time went on and her career was ignored and overshadowed by his success as an Auror, but Draco could tell that there was something that Harry wasn’t telling him about the situation. While they had made a sort of peace after Voldemort was defeated, their relationship was still strained at best, and he had decided not to press for answers. 

Dean Thomas was one of the only other people willing to speak to him about her, and he wasn’t particularly helpful either. He said he had seen her in Hogsmeade and she looked scared. There weren’t any more useful details he could provide and he had forgotten about their conversation entirely until the incident at the pub. 

Ginny nodded silently. She couldn’t be too upset with Percy, it must have been hard on him to have her disappear completely. They had grown pretty close after Ron had moved in with Hermione and the rest of her brothers had all dealt with Fred’s death in their own ways, mostly by keeping to themselves. But she hadn’t said anything to him when she left. She hadn’t said anything to anyone, she just packed up and left. 

“And how do I know you won’t tell anyone why I left?” she questioned, shocked that was she actually considering telling the truth to a Malfoy, of all people. Going to back to the flat she had shared with Harry wasn’t an option, she was certain that she didn’t want to see him. 

“And risk my sterling reputation?” he retorted, sarcastically. Ginny gave him a look that made clear that she did not find his cheekiness amusing, but she also considered that she hadn’t confided in any of her loved ones because she was afraid of putting them in danger. She had no such fears with the Malfoy. 

“I’d need some kind of assurance that you won’t tell anyone.” she admitted, still feeling like she was going insane for trusting him. Draco was surprised but somehow relieved. At the very least, it’d keep his mind off of his real responsibilities for a while. 

“I have something at the manor, an artifact, that would force us both to keep each other’s secrets. Would that be assurance enough?” he asked, trying his best to hide his distaste for returning to his childhood home.


	3. Chapter 2

The doors to the manor opened, revealing a large foyer that was dark and lonely. It had the appearance of being maintained, as though someone had been coming in to clean it regularly, but felt sterile and empty as if no one had actually spent time there in quite a while. Furniture looked pristine and unused, there was no food in the house, no papers or coffee cups lying about. It was a stark contrast to the burrow, which somehow consistently looked like even more people lived there than there actually were. 

Draco avoided her gaze while he led her through the halls, uncomfortable with being back in his childhood home. After leading her through some dark hallways and winding staircases that seemed to come out of nowhere, he opened the door to a small room. It was a room filled with magical artifacts, collected by distant family members over the years, kept in the manor for safe-keeping. Most of them were odd and useless, or had uses that were so specific that they’d never be practically useful. Really, who needs a magic harp that ensures that your grapes grow facing the east? But the item that he was looking for was held here, so he browsed the shelves until he came upon the familiar weathered bronze box. Truthfully, he only remembered this particular item because he’d assisted his mother in going through and making a log of all of the entire collection. Most were forgettable, but this item had stood out to him as actually being practical in a modern setting. He removed it from the shelf and turned to Ginny, who was busying herself examining all the random crap in the room. 

“I found it.” he said, catching her attention away from the plethora of unique objects that surrounded her. She glanced downwards, at the small box in front of her, wondering how this would help their situation. He had already explained to her how it worked, vaguely, something about a pair of bracelets that prevented you from lying to the person wearing the matching one. Supposedly, it also prevented the wearer from telling anyone else about what their partner had confided in them. They were old magic, created a long time ago using psychic charms, and he was unsure of what their original purpose was. To him, they and their counterparts were just another part of the estate that was now his responsibility to manage. 

“So, will it work?” Ginny asked, nervously. She didn’t want to risk Draco running his mouth to her family or friends about why she left and putting them in danger. 

“I don’t see why it wouldn’t...although I’ve never used them before,” he admitted.

Ginny nodded and took a deep breath, placing the bracelet over her wrist while watching her unexpected collaborator do the same. Neither one of them felt any physical changes, as magic was known to provide, but something felt different. 

“Okay. Now, can you tell me why you left?” Draco asked, curiously. The longer she procrastinated on telling him, the more desperately he wanted to know, although he knew that pushing her wasn’t going to get him anywhere. Still, it seemed like these bracelets should provide the security she was looking for. 

Ginny still wasn’t sure how she felt about confiding in Draco Malfoy, of all people, but she knew that she had come too far to back out now. She found that the words just slipped out of her, as if she’d had way too much firewhiskey. She started at the beginning, telling him about how she had been shopping in Hogsmeade, although she could no longer remember what she had been shopping for. It was over a year ago now, and she had felt more carefree than ever. Voldemort had been defeated, she had moved into a flat with Harry, her quidditch career was gaining traction, and it seemed like things couldn’t be better. She couldn’t remember how it happened anymore, but somehow she had lost consciousness, probably by a drugging, and woke up with her wrists bound in what looked like a prison cell. The first person who appeared to her was obviously a child, who couldn’t have been older than 14 or 15, and explained that he was part of the “New Order”, which appeared to be a group of young kids who wanted to bring Voldemort back from the dead, likely because they were too young at this point to remember how terrifying his potential reign would have been. 

The boy had explained that the group suspected that they could use her to bring him back to life, something about her blood and relation to Harry and possession by Tom Riddle himself. It was obvious to her that they weren’t a serious threat. He opened her prison cell, and lifted her to her feet, leading her out into the middle of a large room. The rest of the “New Order” were sitting in a large circle, wearing robes with large hoods over their heads to obscure their faces, and they were chanting something that sounded like broken spells. As the drugs they used to knock her out wore off, Ginny felt more and more annoyed at her situation. Who were these kids and what did they think they could do to her? Easily, she untied herself and fumbled for her wand in her pocket, and started casting on the chanting wizards. She managed to perform her bat bogey hex on one of them before trying to apparate out of there, but one of the members managed to cast Avada Kedavra on her before she left. She could feel her whole body stop as she fell to the floor of her flat, empty. No heartbeat, no movement in her body. Then, all at once, she felt a shock. It felt as though her entire body were on fire, the intensity made her wish she felt empty again. And then, all at once, it was gone. She sat up, and looked around, but nothing seemed out of place. Everything that had happened felt like a bad dream, but her heart was racing and she had a fresh scar on her wrist. 

She continued to explain to Draco that her relationship with Harry had started to fall apart when she asked him to investigate the New Order, after explaining to him what had happened. He went along with it, at first, but she could tell that he didn’t take it very seriously. Eventually, he came back and said that the Aurors didn’t see it as a threat and had more dangerous things to spend their time on, which he couldn’t tell her about. Their relationship never recovered after that. Ginny couldn’t help but feel unimportant to her fiance and it caused her to resent him. Eventually, after countless fights and arguments about it, he moved out of their flat and she started to investigate what had happened to her herself. Harry was the only other person to survive the unforgivable curse, but the situations were totally different. She was certain that she had died, but how was she still here? Her investigations had led her to someone in America who had reported a similar experience, but she was an older woman now who might have died already of natural causes. Still, Ginny couldn’t live without an answer, and she had planned to take a temporary trip to America to see if she could find this woman. She packed a small bag with some clothes and was about to head out, when she heard a knock on her apartment door. 

When she had opened it, the boy from the New Order was standing there. He had a folder in her hands. He explained to her that order was far bigger than she realized, that they knew that she had told Harry about them, and that if she pushed the issue further, they would destroy everyone that she loved. Then, he placed the folder into her hands and disappeared. She opened it, and saw photos of her closest friends. Luna, Neville, Hermione and Ron going into their homes, photos of them working, and even shopping in Diagon Alley. So, she went back into her flat, packed a bigger suitcase, and left. Permanently. 

Draco just stared at her in shock after hearing what she had to say. “That was certainly...more than I was expecting.” he said, feeling the words pulled out of him. He confessed that he was using helping her as a way to avoid dealing with the Malfoy estate, which he found depressing. 

“Wait...why are you in charge of the estate? Where’s Narcissa?” she asked, curiously.

“She’s...in Havenwick.” he admitted, begrudgingly. If there was any doubt that these stupid bracelets worked, it was gone now. He never would have admitted where she was without magical assistance. 

“Havenwick?” Ginny had never heard of it.

“It’s...a place for the addicted. Or disturbed.” he explained, of course his mother couldn’t be kept at St. Mungo’s. She wanted something more discreet about her addiction to happiness potions. 

“You must have your own wing.” she retorted, noting his reputation for frequent drinking. 

“You know, Ginny, you don’t get nearly enough credit for your humor.” he replied, with a soft chuckle. It appeared they had reached an impasse, both having confided their secrets in each other.

“Well, I just need you to get me through Luna’s wedding, and then I’ll leave. We have a deal?” she asked, although it occurred to her that she was getting a lot more out of this than he was. Certainly there were less...dangerous distractions that he could spend his time on. The thought crossed Draco’s mind as well, although if he were being honest with himself, what fun would distraction be if it didn’t pose a challenge? 

“Yeah. We have a deal.”


	4. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ginny agrees to stay in Malfoy Manor temporarily

“So, what are we going to do in the meantime? It’ll be several months until the wedding, yeah?” Draco asked, realizing that it wouldn’t make sense for Ginny to travel back and forth between America and Britain while she was upholding her Maid of Honor duties. He also knew that he wouldn’t be able to stay in his family’s small cottage for months on end, sleeping on the couch. The manor was going to have to be dealt with eventually, whether he wanted to deal with it or not. At this point, he was going to have to come to terms with the fact that his mother wasn’t going to be leaving Havenwick any time soon.

“Would you consider…staying here?” he asked, cautiously, before continuing. “They won’t know to look for you here. So it should be safe.” A couple of years ago, he never would have believed that he’d willingly have a conversation with the youngest Weasley, let alone offer to let her stay in his childhood home, but times had certainly changed. He’d managed to return to Hogwarts after the war and graduate, but barely, and the experience had been anything but a pleasant one. His father, unsurprisingly, had been sent to Azkaban for his crimes in the war and his mother’s letters got more and more incoherent by the day. She’d managed to get off, but barely, and couldn’t live with the shame that came along with it.

Most of the 7th years who returned to school had been given exams for their classes, and were allowed to skip over the ones that they passed. Draco had passed the majority of his, but needed to stay to finish charms and, somewhat ironically, defense against the dark arts. Most of his housemates from his year had refused to return, some because of their families being imprisoned and some because of the shame. Because he only had two classes, he had plenty of free time, and very few people to spend it with. He often spent hours in the library or flying around the quidditch court. It hadn’t been until he had gone home for Christmas that he had seen how badly his mother’s addiction had gotten, and he spent his entire holiday going back and forth from the estate to Azkaban to discuss arrangements with his father. By the time he had returned to school, he had fallen behind in his two classes. The rest of the year was a blur of catching up on schoolwork and wandering the halls with Astoria Greengrass. Daphne had passed all her exams, of course, she had always been a stellar student. Astoria liked being able to say that she was hanging out with a handsome older guy, and she liked Draco well enough, their families were old friends and he had always been close with her sister, but her personal interest in him was mostly confined to their proximity and they stopped keeping in touch shortly after he graduated.

After leaving Hogwarts, it was pretty lonely. He hung around with Blaise and Theo for a while, but people hated seeing them in public. People would hide their children from them, or cross the street to avoid walking near them. Theo dealt with it by drinking copious amounts of alcohol, and Blaise dealt with it by throwing himself into his studies, which left him in an uncomfortable spot. Drinking with Theo was fun, at first, but being Theo’s full time caretaker when he tried to awkwardly hit on any girl that breathed near him or start fights was not, so he started to distance himself. His 18th birthday passed, quietly, with little fanfare. Shortly afterwards, he received the news of the estate becoming his responsibility and set forth avoiding it by any means necessary. At this point, any company, Weasley or not, was welcome.

America hadn’t been a lively time for Ginny, either. She spent most days working, before searching tirelessly in libraries for this mysterious woman to no avail. Occasionally, she sent letters to Luna and only Luna, but there were short and she was certain to make them untraceable in order to protect her. Only a year had gone by since she’d left England, but it felt so much longer. She found herself surprised that she was actually considering his offer of staying in the Malfoy Manor, with Draco himself. Going home didn’t really seem like an option, not one that she wanted to deal with in any case. Ginny honestly couldn’t think of something she dreaded more, outside of her loved ones being hurt of course, than listening to her mother question her about why her relationship with the beloved Harry Potter fell apart. Her mother was a loving and kind woman, but known to be overbearing and blind in her love for Harry. None of her brother’s lived in the Burrow anymore and being there just reminded her of Fred. 

“Fine, but it’s just convenience. I’ll be leaving after the wedding is over.” she replied, reluctantly. 

“I would expect nothing less.” he confirmed, but he couldn’t help but sigh in relief. Having company around while he began to manage the disaster of his family’s affairs was comforting, even under the unusual and somewhat dangerous circumstances. 

He showed her through the manor, leading her through the living area and into the kitchen, which she noticed looked untouched. She wondered how often any of the Malfoys did their own cooking, especially without the help of House Elves. Living on her own in America, Ginny had grown fond of cooking, although she hadn’t mastered cooking small portions. There was always enough food for at least 3 people, and it made her miss the crazy life at the burrow. The manor felt cold and empty by comparison and she almost felt bad for Draco walking through it. 

Eventually, he led her to a bedroom secluded from the rest of the house. It had a bathroom attached to it, a large bed, a dresser, and a closet. The room was plain, the bed had grey sheets and a comforter, but there were otherwise no decorations. She knew she’d have to go back to her and Harry’s flat to get more clothes at some point, but she wanted to put that off as long as possible. Draco explained to Ginny that it was a guest suite, intended for family members staying for extended periods of time, although he couldn’t remember a time when anyone used it, so she was free to stay there until the wedding was over. Awkwardly, they both said goodnight and retired to their rooms, unsure of how they were going to survive the next few months.


	5. Chapter 4

Draco awoke with a start to the sound of metal scraping as pots and pans being moved around in the kitchen. He could feel his heart drop into his chest, as he threw on a robe and ran down the staircase as quickly as he could. The last time his mother had tried to use the kitchen, she had almost burned the place down. 

Half asleep, he scrambled hastily to remove the cookware from his mother’s hands only to find, surprisingly, that they were hot. 

“Mom, stop, we’ve talked about this-AH” he yelped, his hands burning from touching the stove while it was in use. Once startled into consciousness, he realized that he wasn’t talking to his mom at all, but to Ginny Weasley. Suddenly, the events of the previous week came rushing back. Last night, he asked her to stay in the manor with him until after Luna Lovegood’s wedding. He tried to hide the embarrassment on his face, but it was pretty evident. 

“Sorry,” he announced, after clearing his throat and composing himself, adjusting his posture, “Not used to having someone else in the house other than my mom, who was a…difficult housemate those last few months.” 

There was a time when Ginny couldn’t imagine hating someone more than she hated Draco Malfoy, but looking at him now, panicking at the thought of his mom in the kitchen, it was hard not to see him as someone worthy of pity. Narcissa must have been in terrible shape if he couldn’t even trust her to cook breakfast for herself, Ginny thought to herself.

“Well, if I’m ever under attack by my breakfast, I’ll make sure to give you a call.” she replied, going back to cooking. The manor wasn’t particularly well-stocked with groceries, but they did have enough basics on hand to make pancakes. She knew she would have to procure more food for the coming weeks soon, though, and she doubted that anyone in the Malfoy family knew how to cook for themselves. Draco headed back upstairs to his bedroom and proceeded to get dressed for the day, now that he was definitely awake, and tried to put this humbling incident out of his mind. Ginny made herself a plate and realized that she had made more pancakes than she was possibly going to eat, so she found a second plate and set some aside for the ferret king himself. 

Draco dressed himself and headed back downstairs into the kitchen, noticing the second plate set aside for him. In any other circumstance, he would think this was some sort of ruse, but he conceded that they would have to learn to deal with each other for the time being.

The next few weeks passed by without much notice, with Draco mostly going through his family’s affairs. Old memoirs and artifacts needed to be sent off to distant cousins, relatives, and the occasional historical society or museum. He hardly saw Ginny, who mostly kept herself busy in his family’s library furiously going through book after book after book, looking for any explanation for surviving the curse or the scar. Truthfully, he was grateful that they were mostly keeping to themselves, because he found it remarkably humbling to be selling his family’s things. Eventually, he’d have to figure out a way to support himself. He’d be able to maintain the manor indefinitely, that was fortunate, but he couldn’t spend his time doing “detective work” forever. Sooner or later he was going to have to get a real job. 

Late one Thursday night, in the dead of the night, Draco awoke to the sound of blood-curling screaming. He bolted out of bed, and scrambled down the hallway towards the guest suite towards the sound. The door made a large thudding sound against the wall as he flung it open, wand drawn, and charged into the room. She turned her head towards him, mouth open but struggling to make sound, as he rushed over to her. Although she couldn’t manage to speak, her eyes clearly pleaded for help while her body appeared to be shivering. 

Suddenly, Ginny’s body started convulse violently and she started screaming again, causing Draco to grip her tighter. “Ginny? Ginny? What happened? What’s going on?” he asked, frantically. All at once, her body became perfectly still and she started speaking again.

“Can you see anything?” 

The voice coming from her body didn’t sound like hers, but sounded like a young mans. He quickly moved away from her and took a step back.

“If she’s still in America, it should be daytime, right? It’s dark. So is she back in Britain?” the mysterious voice questioned.

Fuck. he thought, hiding under the desk against the wall. He noticed her body start to move to sit up and could feel his heart pounding in his chest. “Petrificus Totalus” he whispered, casting a spell to prevent her body from being able to move. What the fuck was happening? Was somebody trying to bodyjack the Weasley? Why? his thoughts raced, as he tried to regain control of the situation.

“I can’t move her body. Well, I don’t bloody know why, Jim or I’d be moving wouldn’t I?” the voice snipped. Whoever is was hadn’t seen him, thankfully.

Draco realized that whoever was trying to control Ginny’s body was communicating with someone. He could only hear one side of the conversation, but maybe he could speculate what the other side was saying. So far he’d gathered that they wanted to see through her eyes and move her body, but why? They’d figured out that she was back in Britain though, and that wasn’t good, but maybe there could be a way for them to use that to their advantage. Assuming they made it through this situation. He’d never heard of a spell that allowed you to fully control someone else’s body, let alone one that would allow to speak through someone else’s mouth. What sort of magic was this? 

“It’s dark, I can’t see or hear anything either.” the voice paused, presumably to listen to his cohort speak before responding “So she has to be back then, yeah? …No, I still can’t bloody move! I told you!” the voice was getting frustrated now, so Draco made sure to keep his wand at the ready. 

Silence. Ginny’s body was still petrified, and would be for the time being. He prayed that whoever these dark wizards were, they didn’t have a way to undo that. Wasn’t there something they had learned in school about how long the petrification spell lasted? It had to be at least a few hours. He gripped the sides of his desk while he tried to maintain his breathing. What the hell had the Weasley girl gotten herself into?

“Could someone else have taken her for her blood?” the voice asked, sounding genuinely curious. 

Blood? he thought What the hell would they want with her blood? 

He stayed still and listened to the voice argue with it’s inaudible cohorts, before they seemingly agreed that they hadn’t learned anything useful and gave up. The room was silent and it felt like hours passed before he heard stirring from the guest bed. As much as he appreciated the company in the manor, he hadn’t exactly signed up for this much excitement and he couldn’t shake the feeling that she was still hiding something from him. He drew his wand and felt his heart pounding in his chest, listening for signs of the mystery wizards. “M-malfoy?” It sounded like Ginny’s voice again, although she was stammering, which was unusual for her. But the mystery body-jackers didn’t seem to have any idea where she was, let alone that he was there, so she must have been in control of her body again. 

He took a breath and moved out from under the desk, cautiously. 

“Are you alright, Weasley?” he asked, slowly moving towards her. 

She nodded.

“Good. You have a lot explaining to do.”


End file.
